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By Heather Hansman
I
’m starting to imagine fish, to see the flesh of white bellies flashing as the river moves over the rocks. I’m shin-deep in the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, fly rod in my left hand, line in my right. Black flies skim over the green flush of the water. Every time the shadows change, every time I feel a hitch in the gravity of the current, I yank my fly, fighting patience, hoping for fish. I am not a fly fisherman. I am not a fisheranything. I came to northern Montana to try to fix that. I wanted to learn how to cast, to tie knots and pick flies, and to read pockets of busy water to find fish. It’s ended up being so much easier and so much harder than I thought it would be. The Middle Fork of the Flathead River flows 92 miles through the Great Bear Wilderness, the corridor between the Bob Marshall Wilderness and Glacier National Park. It’s the middle of nowhere, so the native cutthroat trout are dumb and lonely. It’s not easy to get to. When the water’s high enough you can fly into the headwaters, but when I went in mid-July the river was low and scrapy below the put in. We drove in through the burned remains of the a fire, then hiked the last hour down to the river, fly rods on our backs, rafts and gear strapped to cranky teenage mules. Darwon Stoneman, owner of the Glacier Anglers guide company, and the first person to commercially run this stretch of the river, pushes the mules down the trail. He cracks a beer once we hit the river and ties on a fly for me. We fish right at the trailhead. There’s a deep green pool upriver and we hike around it, then cast our lines into the riffles at its edge. Hilary Hutcheson, who grew up on this river, was a guide and now hosts the fishing TV show Trout TV, gives me pointers as I fumble with my line. I’ve known Hilary for a while—she invited me on
Get your fishing license, map out where to fish, and create a packing list at takemefishing.org. It’s a resource put together by The Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation (RBFF) with the aim to increase participation, ultimately protecting and restoring aquatic natural resources.
WAM • SPRING | 2013 47